


Love and Life

by screamingsongbird16



Category: Joker Game (Anime)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-23 20:35:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9675122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screamingsongbird16/pseuds/screamingsongbird16
Summary: Valentine's Day is catching on in post-WWII Japan.  And Tazaki's past is catching up to him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tivanny](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Tivanny).



            The market was bustling and brimming with life, even on that cold February afternoon.  Seto Reiko made her way through the crowd slowly.  But her pace was not leisurely.  It was . . .  unconcerned.  Or rather she was unconcerned.  With the crowd, with the market, with life . . .  Her shoulders were slumped with the kind of regrets that life brings to those who don’t know what they have until it’s gone.  And the best part of her life was gone.  She knew that now.  And she had only herself to blame.

            Her life now, was like her pace that afternoon.  Slow.  Painfully slow.  She was a middle aged woman who could be expected to have a good few decades ahead of her still.  But she wasn’t sure if she wanted them or not. 

            A splash of red caught Reiko’s eye, and uncharacteristically, she paused, and looked in that direction.  Flowers.  Roses, in particular.  Lots of them.  A memory stirred in the back of her mind.  Reiko tried to close her eyes against it, but it came to her unbidden.  Her son, tall and handsome, with his gentle smile and storm colored eyes, presenting her with a bouquet of red and white roses.  “Because it’s Valentine’s Day, and you’re the most important woman in my life,” he’d said.  And she had scolded him for not finding a wife before going into the military, unappreciative of the flowers, and unconcerned with foreign traditions like Valentine’s Day.

            In the few years since the war had ended, many things had changed, all throughout Japan.  It had been hard for awhile.  But then things had started to get better.  For most people.  Not Reiko.  Nothing would get better for Reiko.  She had lost everything that mattered to her.  Her husband, before the war ended.  He’d been walking alongside the road and was struck from behind by a car being driven by an intoxicated captain in the army.  There had been no repercussions for him, and no justice or compensation for Reiko’s husband.  Just months of pain, followed by an opioid addiction, followed by an overdose.  And Reiji, their son . . . also gone.  At the war’s end, she’d received the letter.  The letter that went to every family with an unaccounted for, missing and presumed dead son.  Reiko hadn’t even known he’d joined the military.  She couldn’t believe it.  Reiji had been so against becoming a soldier.  Even after her husband raged and threatened to disown him, then went through on his threats.  And Reiko too, had turned her back on him, hoping that he would change his mind, and apologize, and enlist like they wanted him to.  And it seemed he had, without telling them.  But now, Reiko would give anything to take that back. 

            Reiko opened her eyes and her vision was blurry with tears.  She stared at the flower stand forlornly and wished that she’d kept the flowers her son had given her.  No.  She wished that she’d kept her son.  Instead of disowning him.  Driving him into the military, where he didn’t want to go.  She remembered him arguing just why he thought it was a bad idea.  And his arguments had been sound.  He hadn’t wanted to give up all control of his life.  And he hadn’t wanted to have to pretend day in and day out that he believed in a cause that he thought was nonsense.  He’d railed against the notion that their emperor was a god.  His father had nearly hit him for it.  But in the end, he’d enlisted.  Either because he wanted them to take him back once he’d proven himself, or because he had no where else to go.  And it killed him.  They might as well have killed their son themselves.

            Reiko wiped her eyes, then continued on as she always did.  Slowly, like one who’d lost everything she had to care about.  And then she stopped.  And stared. 

            She couldn’t believe her eyes at first.  Or even at second glance.  Because there was a man before her, at a food stall selling steamed buns, who looked so much like her Reiji.  Not how he’d looked when she’d seen him last.  Older.  By the right number of years.  No, he didn’t just look like him . . .

            Reiko began fighting her way through the crowd, struggling to move forward faster, to get to her son.  She wanted to call out to him, but her heart was suddenly in her throat.  And it stayed there, even as she reached Reiji.  But he didn’t notice her.  And unable to speak to get his attention, Reiko did the only thing she could.  She reached out and grabbed onto his arm, with all the desperation of a bereaved mother who realized that maybe, at long last, she could wake from her nightmare.

            Then something happened.  Reiko wasn’t sure what, but one second she was holding her son’s arm, and the next, Reiji had detached himself and put about a meter of distance between them, his eyes narrowed like they always did when he was expecting trouble.  Then he got a good look at her and his expression went slack.  Recognition and surprise crossed over his face.  But quickly, far too quickly, they were gone, and instead Reiji wore a look of polite confusion.

            “I’m sorry.  Can I help you?” her son asked politely, but neutrally.

            “R-Reiji,” Reiko managed to choke.  “Reiji.  You’re alive.  Gods, Reiji, I’ve missed you so much –”

            “I’m very sorry, madam.  But I think you’ve mistaken me for someone I’m not,” said Reiji, cutting her off.

            No.  That was impossible.  Reiko knew her son.  This was Reiji.  She knew it.  There was no way this man wasn’t her son.  He looked exactly right.  His voice was exactly right.  And she knew.  She just knew, the way only a mother could know.

            “Don’t do this,” Reiko begged, realizing what this must be.  Reiji . . . he had every right to be mad, and every right to want to turn his back on her, and deny her, disowning her as she’d disowned him.  But she needed him.  Now more than ever.  “Please Reiji.  You’re all I have left.  Your father . . . he died.  It was the military’s fault.  You were right.  They weren’t what we thought.  I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry.  I never should have turned you away.  You were right.  Please, come home.  Please come back to me.  I need you, Reiji.  I need my baby boy.”

            Tears were streaming freely down her face.  Such a show of emotion in public was so unseemly and embarrassing, but Reiko didn’t care.  She needed Reiji to know.  And come home.  She’d challenge anyone who lost everything, then realized they might be able to get what mattered most to them back not to get emotional. 

            “Come back.  Come back, Reiji.”

            “I . . . am truly very sorry . . . but . . . I’m sorry.  I’m not . . .” Reiji was stumbling.  Faltering.  Which was just like him.  He was a kind boy.  Turning down someone who needed him went against everything he was.  “I’m not . . .”

            “Nii-san?  What’s going on?”

A shorter, younger man had appeared at Reiji’s side.  An angel faced porcelain doll.  He didn’t look too much like Reiji.  Except, somehow he did.  His eyes were much wider, and darker, but their hair color was close enough.  And something about their mouths were similar too.  And their builds.  Both were slender men, but the newcomer was shorter and slighter.

            Something like hate surged through Reiko as she realized that yes, this younger man could be Reiji’s brother.  But she’d only had one son.  Which meant . . . which meant . . .

            “Otouto,” Reiji said, looking relieved by the distraction.  But at the same time, he looked at Reiko uncertainly and . . . and he maneuvered himself slightly so he was between Reiko and the man claiming to be his brother. 

            “No,” Reiko said desperately.  “It’s not true.  Reiji . . . I know that’s not true.  He’s not really your brother.  Please stop pretending.”

            “Who is this woman, Nii-san?” asked the alleged brother. 

            “I don’t know, she just . . .”

            “Reiji, please . . .”

            “I’m sorry, madam.  But I’m not Reiji,” her son lied.

            “My brother’s name is Azaki.  And we need to go.”

            “Please don’t do this . . .  Don’t do this to me . . .” Reiko begged.  And she saw pain flash through her baby boy’s eyes like he was remembering something horrible.

            “I’m sorry, madam,” said Reiji, detaching her from his arm again.  Reiko hadn’t even realized she’d tried to hold onto him again.  “But I really must be going.”

            When Reiko reached out to grab him again, it was deliberate this time, but her hands met empty air.  Reiji had stepped just out of reach so effortlessly that it could have been by chance.  But Reiko knew it had been very deliberate.  Just like the way he gave her a short bow before twisting and melting into the flow of the crowd, almost vanishing in plain sight.

            “Reiji!  Reiji, please!”

            The alleged younger brother stared at her a few moments longer with something like pity in his eyes.  But before she could try to appeal to him, he also gave her a quick bow, then stepped away.  And just like that, they were both gone.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Notes:

 

This fic is set a couple years after the end of WWII.  I don’t think it’s a spoiler to anyone that Japan lost the war.  But the next two chapters have light spoilers in them for what becomes of D-Agency in canon, according to the novels (at least according to a summary of them that I read months ago, that I can’t find anymore to verify) and what I plan to have happen in the aLIvE-verse.  Nothing major for aLIvE-verse spoilers.  Mostly just indications that Something Bad happened, without revealing what that something is.

 

Next chapter will reveal why I’m classifying this as a Valentine’s Day fic, even though it’s not in any way romantic.  (Sorry anyone who was expecting Tazaki/Jitsui)  And right now, the plan is to upload the middle chapter tomorrow (2/13) and the final one on Valentine’s Day, but my internet has been kind of spotty this week because of snow.  So I can’t make promises, but I’ll do my best. :)

 

Stay warm everyone!


	2. Chapter 2

            “Do you want to talk about it?” Jitsui asked, as they entered their safehouse and began checking the precautions they’d set up, to ensure no one entered while they were gone.  Or at least as Jitsui began doing that.  Tazaki, on the other hand, strode to the cabinet and removed a bottle of whiskey.

            “Do you want to talk about Hatano?” Tazaki countered.  He regretted it immediately.  Jitsui straightened slightly, and looked at Tazaki expressionlessly.  “I’m sorry,” said Tazaki quickly. 

            Jitsui only stared at him.

            “That was out of line.  I am truly sorry.”  Tazaki fished a second glass out of the cabinet and poured a whiskey for Jitsui as well.  He held it out to the younger man as a peace offering, but Jitsui only crossed his arms over his chest and continued staring blankly.  “Jitsui . . .”

            “You check our precautions,” Jitsui said, his voice like acid.  He left the front room without another word, and moments later, Tazaki heard his footsteps on the stairs.

            He sighed and downed his own glass of whiskey, trying to banish a great many memories from his mind.  The expressions on his parents faces when they disowned him.  The bewildered hurt in Hatano’s eyes as his world fell apart.  Even years later, that wound was still raw.  Tazaki didn’t know if it would ever heal, but he knew how hard Jitsui was trying.  He should have never brought it up.  But the words his mother had pleaded to him . . . Tazaki knew Jitsui had recognized them too.  Hatano’s words, that cursed day.  Jitsui still blamed himself.  Tazaki knew there was more than enough blame to go round. 

            He poured himself another drink, then picked it, and Jitsui’s up, and followed the younger man up the stairs.  He found Jitsui finishing up his check of the precautions they’d put on the windows and door to the roof, where the pigeons were kept.  Jitsui gave him a frigid look.  When Tazaki held the whiskey out to him again.  Jitsui stared at it for a second then looked up at Tazaki.

            “You didn’t check downstairs.”

            “No,” admitted Tazaki.

            “Can’t you even pretend to be useful?  You’ve always been the weakest in D-Agency.  Please try to pull your weight where you can.”

            That stung a little.  But Tazaki recognized it for what it was.  Jitsui lashing out, and trying to make him hurt, like he’d hurt Jitsui. 

            “I’m sorry about what I said,” Tazaki apologized again.  “And thank you.  For intervening when you did, with my mother.”

            Jitsui wavered.  Then he took the still offered whiskey and downed it in one gulp, and thrust the glass back into Tazaki’s hand.  Then he offered Tazaki an olive branch.  “Things have been better lately.  Had been better.  Before he left on his latest mission and we came here.  I have no reason to think they’re not still going well.  And even if they’re not . . . as long as he’s alive . . . as long as he’s alright . . .”

            “He loves you.  You have to know that,” said Tazaki.  “I’ve believed since the war ended, that the two of you would find your way to the other side of this together.”

            Jitsui sat down on his bed.  Which was technically both of theirs’ bed, since Jitsui still couldn’t sleep through cold winter nights without someone to share body heat with.  Tazaki thought it was proof of Jitsui’s own healing, that he’d allow anyone to help him with that now.  After Hatano . . . broke . . . Jitsui had refused to leach body heat from anyone else, or even warm his blankets by the fire before bed.  His sleepless shivering had been a penitence of sorts.  But things really were getting better.  Hatano had come back to them.  Or rather, come to get them, when what little was left fell apart.  Saved them.  Stayed with them, as much as life allowed.  Forgiven them.  He and Jitsui were trying to make things work between them again.  And on this mission, where it was just Tazaki and Jitsui, Tazaki was permitted to sleep next to Jitsui, and warm up his bed.  Which meant Jitsui didn’t feel the need to punish himself anymore.

            “You know,” said Jitsui, almost out of the blue, “Tomorrow’s Valentine’s Day.”

            “Yes.  I know,” said Tazaki.  He’d noticed that the holiday seemed to be finally catching on here in Japan.  Years ago, before the war, and D-Agency, before he was Tazaki, he remembered coming home from England, where he’d studied abroad, and trying to celebrate the holiday, here in Japan.  His mother had been less than receptive to it.  His father openly scornful.  They had fallen into the same trap as the rest of the nation, at the time.  Insisting that the traditional Japanese way was the only good or right way, and that there was nothing to be learned or respected from other cultures.  Tazaki had tried to make them see that their way of thinking was far too closed minded, and that there was so much they could learn from other peoples that would make their own lives better, and happier.  But he’d failed.  “If Sakuma-san were here, he’d be wondering why there were so many flowers for sale.”

            That probably wasn’t completely true.  Sakuma had gotten much more observant, and better educated.  Plus he was living in Hawaii, where D-Agency was based now, and Hawaii was probably only a decade or two from becoming an official US state.  He almost certainly knew what Valentine’s Day was by now, and if he were here, he’d be able to draw the logical conclusions.  That Valentine’s Day had spread to Japan.

            “I first learned about it when I was a child,” Jitsui continued.  “I was living in Hawaii then too.”

            Tazaki had already known that.  Well, strongly suspected.  But this was the first time he’d gotten confirmation that Jitsui had grown up outside of Japan.  The ban on telling each other about their pasts had more or less been lifted, though Tazaki wasn’t sure exactly when it happened.  But it wasn’t like Yuuki-san would fire them for it anymore.  And it wasn’t like they were all just confessing their whole life stories to each other all at once anymore.  Tazaki had slowly been learning more about who his brothers had been before D-Agency.  And it seemed he was going to learn a little more about Jitsui now.

            “I learned about it in school.  But I misinterpreted the legend of St. Valentine at first,” said Jitsui.  “You know the legend, right?”

            “Yes,” said Tazaki.  “That a long time ago, a roman emperor, allegedly Claudius, refused to allow marriages under his rule, because he was short on soldiers, and wanted to recruit every able bodied man to be one, and didn’t want them being bound to wives, or children, or anyone who would make them want to return home . . . hm, now that I think about it, I’m surprised Hirohito’s puppet masters didn’t have him issue a similar decree.”

            “Even they had to realize that lowering the nation’s birthrate would mean they’d have even fewer soldiers next generation,” said Jitsui.  “But that’s beside the point.”

            “Yes.  The rest of the legend,” remembered Tazaki.  “A priest named Valentine allegedly broke the law and married couples, was eventually caught, jailed, and condemned to be executed, but while waiting for his execution day, began a chaste romance with a woman, some say the daughter of the judge who condemned him, others say the emperor’s daughter.  And before his death, wrote her a final love letter signed ‘Your Valentine.’  Did I miss anything?”

            “Only the dozen or so other variations on numerous points,” said Jitsui, and though his expression remained neutral, Tazaki could tell by his eyes that inside, he was smirking.  “So, nothing important.”

            “I assume that this story is relevant to something?” Tazaki said.  “Though I’m not sure what.”  Nor did he care all that much, as long as Jitsui wasn’t mad at him anymore. 

            “When I first heard the story, I misinterpreted it,” explained Jitsui.  “I was young and unromantic, and when I heard the story, I didn’t see it as a story about a man standing up for love and laying down his life so that other people could have the right to be married.  What I took away from it, was that this man had laid down his life so that other people could have families.”

            Tazaki took a moment to consider this.  And yes.  He could see the appeal that would have to people like them.  Men who’d been strangers in their own families, or had no families, or were disowned by their families.  Men who’d found another family in each other.  The idea of dying for an idea, or cause, or really anything was frowned upon in D-Agency.  Their “Don’t die, don’t kill” motto was still the credo most of them lived by.  Well, the “Don’t die,” part, at least was.  Some of them had quite a bit of blood on their hands.  But all the same.  It wasn’t something they would ever say, but Tazaki absolutely believed, that any one of them would die for their family, if there was no other way to protect it.  So yes.  He could understand why Jitsui might still prefer to see the story of St. Valentine as a man who stood up for families, rather than a man who stood up for romance.

            But he wasn’t naïve enough to think this was only about how Jitsui saw things.  And Tazaki supposed he might as well make this give and take.

            “When I came back from studying in England,” he began, even though it was a bit of a non sequitur, “nothing was the same.  I felt like everything had changed, though in hindsight, I know I was the one who’d chanced.  Everything back in Japan was the same as it had always been.  Including my parents, and the way they saw things.  I was what was different.  My perspective.  Once you open your mind and see things how they really are, you can never really go back to living in a box.  And it was . . . very frustrating.  Watching people I loved drowning in nationalism and ignorance.  Listening to the things they said, that were so ignorant, like how our emperor was a god, and how we needed to go forth and conquer other nations for our empire’s glory.  Like there’s anything glorious about sending men in to occupy foreign countries, shoot anyone who resists, and steal their stuff.”

            The memories were bitter on Tazaki’s tongue.  But he’d kept this bottled up so long, now that he had started, he couldn’t seem to stop. 

            “I tried to make them see things differently.  To get them to open their eyes and see that their way of thinking was illogical, and toxic, but everything I said, no matter how rational, fell on deaf ears.”  Tazaki clenched his fist.  Then unclenched it as soon as he realized what he was doing.  Giving visible cues to their emotional states had never been encouraged in D-Agency.  Even now, when it was only Tazaki and Jitsui, and didn’t really matter, it was still deeply engrained in Tazaki to do everything he could to present the appearance of being calm and in control.  “Things only got worse.  My parents started pressuring me to enter the military.  They were unhappy when I took a job, apprenticed under an engineer at a construction company.  My father sabotaged me.  Went in and told my boss how unpatriotic I was.  I got fired.  Everywhere else I tried to find work, right down to my rock bottom job at a cannery, it happened the same.  My parents wanted me in the military, and tried to cut away every other option that I had.  Eventually, I ran out of money.  Couldn’t find anywhere else to work in my hometown that hadn’t heard what an unnationalistic ingrate I was.  And my father presented me with an ultimatum.  Join the military, or disappear from his sight forever.  So, I left.  Hitch-hiked to Tokyo, picked a few pockets, and then found myself an underground gambling den.  Cleaned up house then, and got into a little bit of trouble with the management, until I convinced them that me cleaning house was intended to be a job interview.  Got hired as a dealer, and that’s where I stayed, until Yuuki-san found me and recruited me for his training.  Then I followed him, and never looked back.  Never regretted it either except . . .” Tazaki knew his face was scrunching in pain as he looked away, but he didn’t care.  “You know when.  But that was the only time.  Even when the military betrayed us, and we went on the run for our lives . . . that was actually kind of fun.  As long as we’re all together.  As long as we’re all still D-Agency, I’m happy.  Because as far as I’m concerned, D-Agency is my real family.  You’re the ones who took me in when my birth family threw me away.”

            It might have been his imagination, but Tazaki didn’t think it was, that Jitsui’s eyes looked brighter than normal.  And his expression had definitely softened when he asked, “But when you saw your mother again?  And when you heard your father was dead?  I know you, Tazaki.  I don’t believe you felt nothing.”

            Tazaki shrugged helplessly.  “I don’t know how I feel, to be honest.  I mean . . . I loved them at one point.  Most of my life.  But they threw me out.  I already knew my father was dead.  He died before the war ended, when we were still working for Japan.  Yuuki-san told me.  He even gave me the option of going to the funeral.  I didn’t.”

            “Do you regret it?”

            Tazaki shook his head.  “Funerals are more for the living than the dead.  You can’t care what people do in your honor when you’re dead.”

            “And you’re still alive.”

            “I wasn’t going to find any closure there.  There was no reason for me to go,” said Tazaki.  “I’ve more or less made peace with the fact that my father was not the man I wanted him to be, any more than I was the man he wanted me to be.  I can’t change it.  I’m not going to kill myself over it.  So, I just live with it.”

            “And your mother?” Jitsui asked.  “Are you really content to let things be?”

            “I’m on a mission –”

            “This mission is a milk run,” said Jitsui.  And . . . he was right, Tazaki knew, as much as he hated to admit it.  Their mission had been to make sure, first hand, that the restoration efforts were succeeding.  Wirtanen, the American spymaster who’d given them asylum, was finally putting them to work, but starting small. 

            “Even so, I’m not choosing her over you,” said Tazaki.  “Or D-Agency, or anyone in it.”

            “You’re acting like you have to choose,” said Jitsui.

            “Don’t I?” asked Tazaki.

            “Do you think you do?” returned Jitsui.  “I think the rules have changed.”

            Tazaki was silent as he considered this.

            “The military we used to work for was dismantled.  The country we now work for recognizes that we have pasts.  They know where we come from, and that we have families back here.  And the war’s over.  There will always be another on the way, yes, but we’re going to be on the sidelines for awhile, doing milk runs and such while our new employers learn they can trust us.”  Jitsui gave a slight shrug.  “I don’t think anyone will have a problem with you being Tazaki most of the time and Reiji on holidays.”

            Tazaki almost winced.  “It sounds really weird, hearing you call me that.”

            “It feels really weird calling you that.”

            Tazaki smiled at Jitsui.  Not exactly a happy smile.  Which wasn’t to say he wasn’t happy.  But suddenly he felt like he was holding back tears and knew it showed on his face.  “When did you grow up so much?  How did you get so wise?”

            Again, Jitsui shrugged.  “I picked up a few things from my big brothers.”

            “Heh.”

            “You don’t have to decide now.  Sleep on it.  For a night or two.  Longer if you need.  We’re here until the end of the month.”

            “But after tomorrow, it won’t be a holiday,” Tazaki pointed out.

            Jitsui smirked.  “I told you to sleep on it.  But it sounds like you’ve already decided.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Notes: Sorry if I made Tazaki come across as too much of a jerk in Chapter 1!  Hopefully this gives some insight into why he acted the way he did.  His mama was hurting, but she had hurt him terribly too.  Meeting her again took him by surprise, and was painful, and it seemed like, in the moment, he had to choose between the parent who disowned him, and the family who’d taken him in, who he knew would kill or die for him.  Jitsui had to make a snap decision when he saw what was going on.  And his decision was to back Tazaki’s play. (Though he and Tazaki are actually undercover as brothers for this mission.)  (But yes, it was quite awkward for him to put himself in the middle of the Seto family drama, lol)

 

On another note, hopefully Jitsui’s original interpretation of the St. Valentine legend helps make this fic passably holiday related.  :)

 

Conclusion chapter tomorrow, weather/internet permitting.  :)


	3. Chapter 3

            It wasn’t hard to find his mother’s address in the city.  Not when he had a name to go by, and a general area to start in, since people tended to shop for groceries in or near their own neighborhoods.  Tazaki’s training had helped him find many more obscure people with much less to go on.  It only took about an hour the next morning for Tazaki to find the apartment his mother lived in.  But then, rather than going to see her immediately, he went back to the safe house.  He needed some time to prepare, and figure out what he was going to say.  He’d spent all last night, trying to find the right words, but they just wouldn’t come.  Now, maybe he’d do better, now that it was daytime, rather than night, and he was more awake and could think . . .  And had time to think . . .

            But then Tazaki started noticing so many things that needed to be done around the safehouse.  Like their breakfast dishes.  He and Jitsui had both left theirs in the sink, as they did every morning.  One of them always washed them before dinner time, along with whatever dishes they used at lunch too.  Today, Tazaki decided he might as well wash them early.  Then he realized that the rag they used for scrubbing the dishes should probably be washed too.  So, since it had to be washed anyway, he figured he might as well do a small load of laundry while he was at it.  And laundry took awhile, since a large bucket had to be filled with water, and whatever clothes he was washing had to be submerged, and rinsed thoroughly, then rung out, then rung out some more, and hung up, then the water needed to be emptied, and by then it was time to start dinner!  Alright, it was a little early, but better early than never.  Or something.  Tazaki was no Fukumoto, but soup was not too complicated.  It just involved a lot of chopping.  Vegetables, mostly.  Meat was still on the rare side, but Jitsui had bought some tofu the previous day, at the market, before Tazaki’s mom had shown up.  And that needed to be cut into cubes too.

            Jitsui showed up late in the afternoon, home early after a day of combing the streets, and observing the general state of things in Japan these days.

            “How did it go?” he asked.  Then he took one look at Tazaki’s expression and sighed.  “You haven’t gone yet.”

            “There was so much stuff to do . . .” Tazaki said weakly.

            “Why are you making soup?  Tonight’s leftover night.  You know that.  And you used my tofu?  I told you that was for tomorrow night’s dinner.”

            “I’ll buy you more tomorrow then.”

            “Stop pretending to be domestic and go see your mother,” said Jitsui, sounding very grownup and adult-like.  Even as he used the stirring spoon in the soup to take a quick taste of it.  Then, abruptly, he put the spoon down and tensed, cocking his head slightly.

            “What’s wrong?” asked Tazaki, then he heard it too.  Well, he heard the door to the roof squeaking horrifically as it opened.  Jitsui must have heard the sound of the lock being picked a few moments earlier.

            Jitsui instantly yanked open the silverware drawer and pulled up the trey that kept the different utensils sorted.  He came up with two guns and tossed one to Tazaki.  They took up positions on opposite sides of the kitchen, out of the immediate line of sight of anyone entering from the hallway, and both aimed their guns.

            But the intruder spoke, right as he reached the bottom of the stairs, before entering the hallway to the kitchen, long before he should have been able to see them.  “What are you two bums doing home at this hour?” Hatano asked.  “Shouldn’t you be out making sure the masses are placated?  Or whatever else it is Uncle Sam sent you here to do?”

            Tazaki smiled.

            “Hatano.”  Jitsui couldn’t hide his mixture of both apprehension and delight.  He set his gun on the counter and hurried forward to meet him.  “What are you doing here?”

            “I wrapped up my mission early.  Went back to Hawaii.  Found out you weren’t there.  And . . . I wanted to see you.”  Hatano shrugged as he entered the kitchen.  Then he set a paper bag with the logo of a steamed buns shop, and a box from a local confectionary on the counter beside Jitsui’s gun.  “I brought you some red bean buns and omanju.”

            “Two things this time?” asked Jitsui.  Tazaki hid a smirk.  It was Hatano’s usual custom to come bearing malasadas when he came home to the coffee farm where D-Agency was based now.  Tazaki suspected that was so people would have something to stuff their faces with, which helped avoid some of the awkwardness that they still couldn’t quite get past.

            “It’s Valentine’s Day,” said Hatano with another shrug.  Then he smiled.  And . . . it wasn’t quite his old smile.  There was no mistaking the Hatano who stood before them now for the boy they’d known before the war, even if he did look almost exactly as young as he had when they first met, while all the rest of them had aged appropriately.  His hair was a little different now, to account for his eyepatch.  And there was a weariness and sadness around him that didn’t belong around someone who looked as young as he did.  But Hatano was trying.  They could both tell he was trying really, really hard. 

            That was probably what gave Jitsui the courage to close the distance between them and gather Hatano up in his arms.  “How did you know you’re exactly what I wanted?”

            “Lucky guess,” Hatano said, tensing at first, the way he once had whenever anyone touched him, but then stiffly returning the hug.  He rested his head on Jitsui’s shoulder, like he was exhausted.  Then he just held on.

            “It’s good to see you, Hatano,” said Tazaki, taking Jitsui’s gun, and his own, and returning them both to their hiding place in the silverware drawer.  “But I should be going.”  Then he grabbed his coat and headed for the door.

            “Good luck,” called Jitsui softly after him.

            “Thanks,” Tazaki said.  “You too.”  Then he walked out into the cold.

            A very large part of Tazaki wanted to stay.  The safehouse was nice and warm, the soup was close to finished, and his little brothers were there.  He would have liked to have spent the evening with them, but he thought they deserved some privacy.  Hatano hadn’t come all the way to Japan to see him, after all.  And hopefully Hatano would talk more, and open up more, if it was just Jitsui.  Hopefully bridge some more of the pain and tension between them.  They were trying so hard to get back to where they’d once been.  And Tazaki honestly believed that they could.  They’d never be the same people they once were.  But that didn’t mean they couldn’t find their way back to the same love that had made them so happy.  And, he supposed reluctantly, the same reasoning applied to his own situation.  The love he was trying to restore was familial, rather than romantic, but the situation was still very similar.  Pain, misunderstanding, and betrayal had led him to where he was now too.  But despite it he still wanted to get back part of what he’d once had.

            It had gotten even colder outside.  And dark was starting to fall now.  That forced Tazaki to walk faster, to keep from freezing.  Otherwise he would have slowed his steps to put the impending reunion off a little longer.  He did want it to happen.  But . . . he was scared.

            He did make one stop along the way.  One final act of procrastination to make up for having to walk fast.  He stopped at a corner store, with paper hearts and crepe paper streamers in the window, advertising its Valentine’s Day merchandise, and bought a bouquet of red and white roses, tied with pink ribbon.  Much like the bouquet he’d bought for his mother, that she hadn’t appreciated, years ago, before D-Agency, and the war, and before being disowned.  A small, superstitious part of him wondered if maybe he was cursing himself.  But the rational part of him knew better.  If the gesture failed again, it was because his mother really hadn’t changed.  Not because the flowers were bad luck.  In fact, Tazaki mused, he was quite lucky to get them at all.  The store was down to its last few bouquets.  In America, or even its territories, by this hour, every last bouquet and flower arrangement in any store you could find would have already been snatched up by other romantics, gentlemen, men who fancied themselves as either, and of course, procrastinators.  In a few years, the same would probably be true in Japan by this hour.  American traditions were catching on fast.

            But that aside, roses in hand, Tazaki finally made his way home.  Well, to his mother’s home.  Not the house he’d grown up in with his parents, and ultimately been kicked out of.  Life had not been kind to his mother in the years following that fallout.  Tazaki assumed she’d been forced to sell the house.  But she owned the apartment where she lived now, and she had a job as a seamstress.  She was getting by.  But from their brief meeting, Tazaki had the feeling that she was only really going through the motions of living.  Not actually living.  Or moving on.  Considering how she’d acted, Tazaki didn’t think it was too naïve to hope that . . . well, he didn’t actually know what he was hoping for.  A second chance, maybe.  For both of them. 

            From the corner store, it was a fairly short walk to his mother’s apartment.  His steps slowed as he climbed the flight of stairs that led to her door, and he felt that nervous, flighty feeling starting to well up inside him.  The urge to run away rather than risk rejection, or messing this up again, or feeling even more pain, was very, very strong.  But despite the common label of a coward that had been applied to the men of D-Agency, every man there had possessed more courage than most people would ever know.  Especially when it came to anything relating to the few people they loved. 

            So Tazaki continued on to his mother’s door, took a deep breath, and then knocked.

            Footsteps from within.  Soft.  Tired.  The footsteps of someone in no hurry because there was nothing left in life to care about.  Tazaki felt a hand squeezing his heart, and hated himself a little bit for even thinking of leaving his mother in this state, and shutting her out of his life.

            The door opened.  And his mother, whose eyes had been on the ground, slowly raised her gaze.  When her eyes met Tazaki’s, they shone with tears. 

            “R-Reiji?” she asked in disbelief, her voice breaking on her son’s name.

            Tazaki gave her one of his top shelf smiles.  The rare, real ones, usually only seen on his face when he was amongst his brothers.  He found his own vision was a little blurry now.  But considering the tears he saw streaming down his mother’s face, he didn’t think she would mind.

            “Mom . . . hi,” Tazaki said, a little awkwardly, and a little self conscious, as he held out the bouquet of roses.  “Happy Valentine’s Day.”


End file.
